


My Love Goes With You As Your Love Stays With Me

by SoDoLaFaMiDoRe



Category: Pacific Rim (Movies)
Genre: I also wrote this on the plane, I'm so tired I was awake 2 days when I wrote this no editing no beta, M/M, So yeah I'm not tagging write that's just how it be, i love these boys, set post PR1, spoilers for PR2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-06
Updated: 2018-04-06
Packaged: 2019-04-19 08:40:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14233512
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SoDoLaFaMiDoRe/pseuds/SoDoLaFaMiDoRe
Summary: Set Post-Drift, how it affected Newt and Hermann over the course of their time.





	My Love Goes With You As Your Love Stays With Me

**Author's Note:**

> Title shamelessly stolen from Leonard Cohen, I hope you enjoy! :D
> 
> Also note I was awake over 30 hours when I slammed this out on the plane so please forgive me.

Ghost drifting was a side-effect Hermann had been well-informed on. There was no way not to pick up how drift partners would begin to mirror one another, from manners of speech to physically changing the way they moved their bodies. Hermann felt as if he'd developed a nervous tick of some kind, stopping himself from moving his hands as he spoke to emphasize a point. He suddenly had a much deeper understanding of the different parts of the Kaiju Newt had sprawled around his side of the lab as Newt continued to study them.

He'd seen the changes in Newt as well. The biologist seemed to still more often, staring at Hermann's chalkboards as the flashes of deeper understanding crossed his features, truly grasping the equations that had formed the throat theorem. Hermann wasn't one for sentimentality, having been so focused during the war on doing what needed to be done he had never truly taken the time and step back to appericiate his theorem. He felt a swell of pride and something else when Newt finally took the time to appericiate his side of the lab and the work that had gone into it. 

When they got the news to pack up, that the Shatterdome and the UN needed them in Geneva to help explain how the hell they'd survived, Hermann couldn't help the bittersweet feeling in his chest. He had just been working up the courage to erase years of chalk from the boards, make a clean slate, when Newt had run into the lab clearly breathless. He'd managed to find a working camera someone was willing to part with, a jury-rigged selfie stick in his hand as he shot Hermann a knowing look.

They didn't need to speak as much anymore, didn't need the words. Hermann stood out of the way as Newt meticulously documented the lab, trying to get a whole picture of the shared space before zooming in on the details, not wanting to miss a moment from the holo-projector and taking care to capture each and every chalkboard in its entirety. He even managed to cajoule Hermann into a picture in front of his chalkboards, talking about making sure to smile properly, for it was going into the history books. Hermann took a few pictures of Newt posing with some of the various Kaiju guts, including the brain that he had first drifted with, holding the PONS helmet aloft as a trophy.

"Well, we couldn't have done it separate, wanna take a selfie together?" Hermann felt his heart lift, either his own emotions or being affected by Newt's own, but he couldn't resist a smile as Newt threw an around around them together, holding the stick aloft as they both stood on their respective sides of the fading tape line. Hermann felt a sense of recklessness overcome him, heart squeezing as he decided _to hell with it._ Turning his head, he went to kiss Newt on the cheek in the photo, only to realize too late that Newt had apparently had the same idea.

Their lips chrased together as the click from the stick sounded, letting them know the photo had been snapped. Hermann felt a flush creep up his neck, face beet red as he stammed out an apology. When he looked Newt in the eyes though, he didn't sense any judgement or hesitation from the other, Newt's eyes sparkling as he smiled back at Hermann, his own cheeks tinged slightly red. And if Hermann saved that photo in his wallet for the next decade as they parted ways, well, that was his own choice.

And he'd just started to be able to stand Newton's music.

 

\-------

Searching Newton's apartment had been a quick snapshot of the absolute mental hell his mind had been for the past decade. Portions of it were trashed, top-shelf strong alcohol drunk as if it was water, and the Kaiju brain with Alice written all over like some lovesick schoolboy's notebook. Hermann had cursed itself enough for not seeing it sooner, not noticing how his partne- _friend_ had grown so distant, changed so much. They'd searched the place from top to bottom, Hermann getting a flash in his head as clear as day over the drift. Slamming open the nightstand drawer, he thumbed a false bottom and lifted it away to reveal a small booklet.

The dates were nearly eight years old, written mostly in a messy scrawl only the truly wasted could produce as Newt poured his heart out on the pages. From the nightmares, to the whisperings in his head, to the constant _craving_ his body had been dealing with to drift again. Hermann felt his own tears shed for the other as he thumbed on like a man possessed, each new agony a lash on his own heart as he realized just how much the other had suffered, forced to wall Hermann off to protect the mathemetician from his mental torture.

When Hermann got to the end he wanted to throw the cursed book at Alice's tank, scream at the listless brain for what she had taken from him, from _them_. He felt his energy drain, sitting roughly on the bed. A scrap of paper fluttered free from the book, and even with his drained emotions Hermann summoned the strength to snatch it, opening the small scrap to reveal a familiar photo. It had been creased beyond recognition in some points, the edges frayed and the colors running from where the paper had been wet, but there they were, kissing each other with all the hope of a long future ahead of them.

Hermann folded it stiffly, tucking it back into the book as he stuffed it in one of the inner pockets of his jacket. He was going to rescue Newt if he had to jump into the Anteverse and fight every Precourser himself.

**Author's Note:**

> Tell me what you think!


End file.
